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Congratulations! You are a curious enough person that you decided to click on this link and maybe broaden your horizons a bit. I hope you find something here you can connect with and relate to.

This is the first post of what I hope will be many about my long, slow, and interesting journey to minimalism. I've been reading about minimalism since I started college in 2013. It has always held this interest for me because it seemed like a lifestyle I had no chance of being a part of. I would get inspired on a random weekend and clean out my closet, only to go thrifting the next week and fill it back up with things I didn't need or really even want - like that green tie-dye shirt with a kitten on it. In those first two years of college, not only did I commit major crimes of fashion, but I spent money that could have been put to better use in savings or a travel fund.

Fast forward to September 6th, 2015. I was twenty four hours out from leaving the country for four and a half months and trying to fit all my precious things into my suitcase(s) and bags. I had to be able to carry it all with me. And guess what? I did it. And when I got back in December, I had carried things across the world that didn't get worn, read, or used at all. I was too busy having the experiences of a lifetime to think about maintaining all these things. I learned that I could live with a lot less.

Fast forward to now. I'm thirteen weeks away from graduating college. I have no idea what lies after graduation concerning a job, where I will live, how my life will look at all. This uncertainty is a whole other blog post, and I'm trying hard not to think about it. But one thing I do know about this very uncertain time in my life is that I own too many things. I own too many things that hold guilt, or sad memories, or hold no value at all. I spend entirely too much time in my life organizing and cleaning and maintaining things that serve no real purpose in my life. They are excess things and I simply don't have time to deal with these excess things anymore.

The idea of this post started as a listicle of why I want to be a minimalist; the list got long but with each reason it boiled down to this truth:

I want to be minimalist so that I can shift my mental, emotional, and spiritual focus ​from thingsto people, relationships, and experiences.

And that, my friends, is where I will leave you. I will keep the specifics of what led me to this statement to myself. You now know why, and in the weeks to come you will know the how. How am I minimizing my life? What do I think adds value my life? What books/articles and I reading, what TED Talks am I listening to, and videos am I watching that help me understand what minimalism is and what is means to different people?